I know this is rather long, and written with Swiss contributions in the back of their minds - but it seems to be a German language project - and they are talking about funds available ;-). Best regards - Wolf ---------------------- Wolf W. Seelentag, PhD, e-mail : wolf@swissmail.com Reherstr. 19, CH - 9016 St. Gallen, Switzerland Tel (home) : +41-71-2885121 Tel (work) : +41-71-4942233 Fax : +41-71-4942893
---------- Von: Outriggger@aol.com[SMTP:Outriggger@aol.com] Gesendet: Freitag, 20. November 1998 22:24 An: randolph.head@ucr.edu; philipp@mindspring.com Cc: Swiss.Genealogy@bigfoot.com; dschmutz@es.com; JMattli@aol.com; pbandley@email.msn.com; pearson@interx.com; schick@datacomm.ch Betreff: FW: German - American Project
Subj: German-American Project Date: 11/20/98 3:38:39 PM Eastern Standard Time From: hook@fas.harvard.edu (Jessica Hook) To: Outriggger@aol.com
Paul Savage informs me that you have had trouble trying to reach me through the Swiss-American web site (due to a problem which is hopefully fixed). I apologize for having taken this long to get back to you. In this e-mail I am including an invitation to the project (which includes a summary of what we hope the project will accomplish) and an update from Professor Sollors which describes the kick-off conference. Please let me know what specific information could be of use to you.
Thank you for your interest (and your patience).
Jessica Hook assistant to Werner Sollors
German-American history and literature in the context of American multilingualism
November 1998
Dear colleague,
I am writing you in order to invite you to become part of the new international project devoted to German-American history and literature that is directed by Winfried Fluck and me with support from the German-American Academic Council Foundation (GAAC)/Stiftung Deutsch-Amerikanisches Akademisches Konzil (DAAK) for a three-year period.
Our ultimate goal is to bring the most important issues of German-American history and the most outstanding works of German-American literature back to public attention on both sides of the Atlantic, and all in the larger context of multilingualism. We are planning conferences, reprints, new editions, and the support of new scholarship. Winfried Fluck and Werner Sollors are eager to use the funds only to accomplish what we set out to do, that is "to locate and identify historical and literary materials from the German-American tradition that could be of broader general interest at this moment."
As our focus is on multilingualism of the American heritage, the "German" part of the project refers more to language than to nationality. Austrian, German, and Swiss immigration to the United States all fall under the umbrella of the project, though topics of German national affiliation have been most quickly adopted. A de facto exclusion of Austrian and Swiss topics would be most unfortunate, and we would expecially welcome adoption of Swiss topics for the project and the volume arising from the conference of September 1998. I would be grateful if you could keep in mind a submission date of January 1, 1999 for essays resulting from your conference presentations. Additionally, if you know of other scholars who might be interested in participating, please mention them to us (with contact information sufficient to reach them) so that we might invite them to participate.
As part of the initial grant application, we mentioned the ongoing publication plans for Ludwig von Reizenstein's Geheimnisse von New Orleans (in an English translation by Steven Rowan); and there is also the possibility of translating Ferdinand Kuernberger's novel Der Amerika-Muede (1855). We also thought possible the writings by American followers of Count Nicolaus Ludwig von Zinzendorf (1700-60), together with the rigorous Freudian exegesis by Oskar Pfister in his study Die Froemmigkeit des Grafen Ludwig von Zinzendorf: Ein psychoanalytischer Beitrag zur Kenntnis der religioesen Sublimierungsprozesse und zur Erklaerung des Pietismus (1910) ; Franz Daniel Pastorius's early multilingual writings; or Francis Lieber's innovative work on the first Encyclopledia Americana.
Since the initiation of the project, Theodor W. Adorno's American dreams have been translated by Anne Halley and have appeared bilingually in the Antioch Review, Peter Conolly-Smith's important 1996 Yale University dissertation, "The Translated Community: New York City's German-Language Press as an Agent of Cultural Resistance and Integration, 1910-1918" has been accepted for publication by the Smithsonian Press; Kenneth Kronenberg's book Lives and Letters of an Immigrant Family: The Van Dreveldts' Experiences along the Missouri, 1844-1866 is about to be published by the University of Nebraska Press; and William Roba's edition of August Richter's A True History of Scott County, Iowa (1917) will appear with St. Ambrose University Press this year. Some have meanwhile made proposals for new editions/translations of Reinhold Solger's Anton in Amerika , the anonymous St. Louis play Die Emigranten, a selection of Ottilie Assing's writings, an anthology of German-language writing in the United States in the period just before and during World War I, a reader of women's journalism, a third collection based on the writings published in Aufbau, the poetry of German exiles like Rose Auslaender, and English translations of the fiction of Jeannette Lander. In addition, a republication of Francis Grund, Die Aristokratie in Amerika (1837), and a partial publication of George Condoyannis's unpublished dissertation on German-American fiction have been recommended. Some mention was also made to me of the desirability of an anthology of German-American literature that could be used as a textbook in high schools and colleges.
The initial application included, in addition to the "group leaders," the following participants and letter-writing supporters ("partners"): Monika Blaschke (Bremen), Peter Conolly-Smith (New York, NY), Reinhard Doerries (Erlangen), Peter Freese (Paderborn), Anne Halley (Amherst, Mass.), Wolfgang Helbich (Bochum), Wolfgang Hochbruck (Stuttgart), Dirk Hoerder (Bremen), Heinz Ickstadt (FU Berlin), Hans-Joachim Lang (Erlangen/Hamburg), Christoph Lohmann (Indiana), Berndt Ostendorf (Muenchen), Heike Paul (Muenchen), Lawrence Rosenwald (Wellesley), Steven Rowan (Missouri-St. Louis, USA), Marc Shell (Harvard), Don Heinrich Tolzman (Cincinnati), Frank Trommler (Pennsylvania), and Theodore Ziolkowski (Princeton). In addition to these, numerous other scholars, students, and writers have expressed an interest in, and joined, this project.
Winfried Fluck and I are eager to use the funds only to accomplish what we set out to do, that is "to locate and identify historical and literary materials from the German-American tradition that could be of broader general interest at this moment." The more publications that result from our efforts, the better our chances will be to secure further support in the future. Anything that you can do to help with this goal will be appreciated. For example, are there any publishers or editors with whom you are in touch and who might be interested in publishing German-American literature or scholarship, in the United States, in Switzerland, or elsewhere? Or do you know of individuals, associations, libraries, or companies, that might be willing to sponsor or cosponspor some or our projects?
Sincerely,
Werner Sollors
UPDATE
Dear Colleague:
The German-American Conference at Harvard University which took place September 17th to 19th went very well. Sander Gilman of the University of Chicago gave the keynote address, reviewing the history and raising questions regarding the future of German-American studies. Frank Trommler gave an overview of past scholarly efforts and suggested possible future directions for the field. Thirty to forty registered participants listened for two days as panelists explored a range of topics including possible candidates for translation, Ottilie Assing (the German mistress of Frederick Douglass) -- a project that was accepted for publication right on the conference floor --, and the changing nature of German-American theater in New York at the turn of the century. Gert Niers and Norbert Krapf provided a poetry reading. The question-and-answer sessions proved especially fruitful. Participants focused on the value of works (aethetic or historic); the perception of the German-Americans as a unified people rather than a diverse number of groups such as German-Texans, Pennsylvania Germans, and Cincinnati Germans; the way which the term "German" often subsumes Austrian and other national identification and has sometimes excluded German-speaking Jews; and the possibilities of keeping in mind other languages involved in German-American culture, particularly Yiddish, Low German, and Spanish. I think the conference did exactly what I hoped it would do: it established some new connections between Germanisten and Americanists, younger and senior scholars, Americans and Europeans, wizards in electronic bibliographic research and teachers, writers, and translators--all around the issue of German-American writing. I think the conference did exactly what I hoped it would do: it established some new connections between Germanisten and Americanists, younger and senior scholars, Americans and Europeans, wizards in electronic bibliographic research and teachers, writers, and translators--all focused on the issue of German-language writing in the United States in the context of American multilingualism. As the next step, we should now be thinking of a conference volume. I am enclosing a tentative table of contents and would like to mention that I already received a tentative expression of interest from an American press. This would be a good time, then, to include more essays by interested scholars who could not come to the conference, and I would like to invite you to propose a contribution (the completed version of which should be in my hands by the end of the calendar year 1998). Such a volume could further help to put research in German-American literature back on the academic agenda. In addition, we continue to collect proposals for publications and translations with the intention of submitting them (or making it easier for you to submit them) to publishers, drawing on some readers' reports that have already been sent in, and on others that will undoubtedly be prepared in the future. I think of my own and Winfried Fluck's function very much as that of a middleman, bringing projects to the attention of publishers and foundations (e.g. INTER NATIONES for translations), offering mostly recommendations, matching proposals and readers' reports, or (at best) an occasional subsidy with the help of TransCoop. As a kick-off event for the German-American Project, the conference served its purpose of effecting an exchange of ideas and questions. I was pleased with the result, and thank you for your support and interest.
Best Wishes,
Werner Sollors
GERMAN? AMERICAN? LITERATURE?: New Directions in German-American Studies edited by Winfried Fluck and Werner Sollors
Introduction by Werner Sollors (Harvard University)
Sander Gilman (University of Chicago) "German? American? Literature? -- Some Thoughts on the Problem of Question Marks and Hyphens"
Frank Trommler (University of Pennsylvania) "Preserving German-American Culture: A Learning Experience"
Part I: From Franz Daniel Pastorius to the 1848s
Introduction: Frank Trommler
Lutz Görgens (German Consulate, Boston), "Alexander von Humboldt and America"
Alfred Brophy (Oklahoma City University) "Francis Daniel Pastorius's Bee Hive and the Reconstruction of Pietism"
A. Gregg Roeber (Pennsylvania State University) "J.H.C. Helmuth's Reflections on Evangelical Doctrine with Some Thoughts on the Present Times"
Kenneth Kronenberg (translator, writer, editor) "Personal Traits, Success, and Failure in Immigration: The Letters of the Van Dreveldts"
Part II: Mysteries and the West
Introduction: Werner Sollors (Harvard University)
Elliott Shore (Bryn Mawr) "Die Geheimnissse von Philadelphia"
Steven Rowan (University of Missouri-St. Louis) "Three German-Americans View St. Louis, Cincinnati, and New Orleans: Heinrich Börnstein, Emil Klauprecht, and Ludwig von Reizenstein"
Irene Di Maio (Louisiana State University ) "Multiculturalism in Friedrich Gerstäcker's North American Narratives"
Theodore Gish (University of Houston) "Literature and German-Language Publications in Texas"
Thomas Jaehn (Stanford University) "German-American Literature and American Multilingualism"
Part III: From the 48ers to 1917
Introduction: Winfried Fluck (Freie Universität Berlin)
Dieter Marcello (filmmaker) "German 48ers During the American Civil War"
Britta Behmer (Amerika Institut, Ludwig-Maximilians Universität) "Ottilie Assing: A Gap in History"
Christoph Lohmann (Indiana University, Bloomington) "Perceptions of Race and Slavery in Ottilie Assing's Journalism, 1853-65"
Sieglinde Lemke (John F. Kennedy Institute, Free University Berlin) "The 'German' W.E.B. Du Bois"
Sabine Haenni (University of Chicago) "Yiddishizing German-American Theater: Inter-ethnic Contact and Formation of German-American Ethnicity in the 1890s"
Lawrence Rosenwald (Wellesley College) "Translation, Language Betrayal, and Die Emigranten"
Peter Conolly-Smith (DeVry Institute) "Hugo Münsterberg and The Photoplay"
Part IV: 20th-Century Exiles and Immigrants
Introduction: Frauke Lenckos (Memorial Foundation for Jewish Culture)
Walter Hölbling (Institut für Amerikanistik, Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz) "Austrian Exile Publishers"
Frauke Lenckos (Memorial Foundation for Jewish Culture) "German Jewish Women's Exile Poetry 1933-1993"
Kathleen Rose (University of Maryland) "Simkhe: Yiddish Words of Love"
Heike Paul (Universität Leipzig) "Multilingualism and Metaphors of Musicality"
Contemporary German-American poetry by Norbert Krapf and Gert Niers
Afterword by Winfried Fluck
Appendix I: Steven Love (Hilles Library, Harvard University) "Electronic Resources for Researching German-American Materials"
Appendix II: A German-American Bibliography by Jessica Hook (Harvard College) and Martha Creedon (Widener Library)